Category: music

The simmering tensions between Iran and the West apparently aren’t limited to the geopolitical arena. This summer, after taking a German orchestra on a Mideast tour which included two concerts in Tehran, conductor Michael Dreyer received more than 100 irate e-mails from people who don’t approve of his efforts to reach across international boundaries with music. But he isn’t the only one making the attempt…

Does your train station have a concert hall, and an internationally celebrated pianist to play in it? New York’s does: “Vanderbilt Hall, cavernous and echo-y, is not an ideal acoustical environment for serious piano listening.” But Yefim Bronfman, teaming with a New York food bank to raise money to fight hunger, tackled the tricky acoustics with a morning rush hour recital, performed in front of a crowd of jaded Big Apple commuters.

The Scottish Chamber Orchestra is a deeply impressive group, says Michael Tumelty, and could even rank as Scotland’s best classical ensemble. So why don’t you hear much about them? “Let’s be brutally frank: when was the last time you had to queue at the box office, far less round the block, to get a ticket for an SCO concert? Indeed, when was the last time you overheard or participated in one of those animated pub or street conversations where folk raved about the world-class orchestra that played weekly on their doorstep?”

Conductor Daniel Barenboim has courted Wagner-related controversy in the past, challenging Israel’s unofficial ban on the notoriously anti-Semitic composer’s music. Now, he’s bringing his Divan Orchestra, made up of Palestinian and Israeli musicians, to Berlin, to perform Wagner’s Die Walküre at Waldbuhne, the outdoor arena built for the Berlin Olympics in 1936 at which some athletes gave the Nazi salute in front of Hitler.

“Music competitions, at their peak, were a fast track for real talent and a window for the world on the effort that goes in to making an artist, more hours of practice each childhood day than most adults spend at work.” Now there’s “American Idol” and “Classical Star”…

“Symphony No 13, subtitled Hallucination City, was first performed in New York in 2001, and has been heard half a dozen times since then across the US and Europe. As with all the performances, the call goes out for recruits for the London show: 100 volunteers, all unpaid, must supply their own guitar and amp, be able to read music, and (to paraphrase) ought to have some idea what they’re getting themselves into.”

No, not the guitar. Or the keyboard. Ukeleles are sweeping British schools. “The four-stringed instrument beloved by vaudeville acts and Hawaiians is also enjoying a renaissance outside the classroom, even becoming a must-have accessory for some teenagers.”

Seattle Opera has named Asher Fisch, an Israeli conductor who has appeared with the company since 2003, as principal guest conductor. Fisch, who is based in Israel and the music director of the Israeli Opera, is a 2006-07 winner of the Seattle Opera Artist of the Year award. He made his company debut in 2003 with Parsifal.”

“The petition to U.S. District Judge Michael Davis, among other things, challenges the constitutionality of the 1976 Copyright Act, the law under which the RIAA sued Jammie Thomas of Minnesota, as well as over 20,000 other defendants. The $750 to $150,000 fines the act authorizes for each download is unconstitutionally excessive and against U.S. Supreme Court precedent, wrote Brian Toder, Thomas’ attorney.”

BBC Two is airing an “ambitious five-part series in which the punky cellist Matthew Barley puts 18 teenage musicians through their paces, after which a panel of classical experts either votes them through to the next round or consigns them to musical history. The result, it is hoped, is that the one who survives the final cut will be the proverbial ‘complete package’ – a superstar-in-the-making who can survive the commercial market while also managing to ‘broaden the appeal of classical music’. Classical Idol this definitely isn’t, however.”